


Healthy and Happy - Eventually

by Antimatics



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Venom (Movie 2018)
Genre: Alien Cultural Differences, Angst, Blood and Gore, Body Horror, Cannibalism, Codependency, Graphic Description, Graphic Description of Corpses, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Loss of Limbs, M/M, Murder, Pain, Possessive Behavior, Protectiveness, Sort Of, The Avengers Don't Like Venom, Vigilantism, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-28
Updated: 2018-11-04
Packaged: 2019-08-09 04:49:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16443215
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Antimatics/pseuds/Antimatics
Summary: Eddie Brock and Venom: a match made in Heaven. Eddie's still adjusting to having Venom on board and being 'we' instead of 'me' - but he loves it. They wouldn't have it any other way.The Avengers on the other hand. Well, they'd like it to be any other way. Aliens are a pretty familiar concern and well, just because they ended up on the West Coast doesn't mean they won't be checking in. In fact, might as well have them over to New York for dinner sometime.





	1. Fine Dining

            After the whole ordeal with the Life Foundation and that asshole Riot – Drake was also an asshole don’t think we forgot about that bag of dicks – Venom was still weak, they both were. Eddie wouldn’t tell Venom but he was worried about his other half, it had been a few months and by now he would’ve thought they’d be back to normal, which was far from anyone else’s normal, but normal for them.

            Venom had gotten a lot better, enough so that he could form a suit around Eddie again and they could comfortably fight bad guys without having to worry about their safety too much. That may have been part of the problem though, Eddie had been a little… squeamish about the fact that to Venom, ‘fighting’ the bad guys really meant ‘hunting and eating the people Eddie said he could’. He didn’t let Venom eat nearly as many people as he wanted, and he was starting to feel like that may be part of the reason Venom wasn’t back to his usual self. Rats in back alleyways could only do so much.

            Venom was more tired than he had been before their near-death experience, chiming in less during Eddie’s normal day-to-day life and taking longer in the morning to wake up once Eddie had already started their day.

            Eddie was tired too, it seemed no matter how much sleep they got he couldn’t get rid of the dark circles under their eyes or the sickly hue of their skin.

            Eddie knew it had to do with a lack of food for his Symbiote, tater tots and chocolate only carried you so far when compared to eating a human being. If people had nutritional labels they wouldn’t exactly match up with the ones on the foods Eddie preferred.

            It was obvious what he had to do, and the fact the Venom was obviously weakening himself just to make Eddie more comfortable with their, shall we say ‘unique’ lifestyle said a lot about their bond. Eddie didn’t want to repay that kind of sacrifice by starving Venom.

            When they did eat people, Venom was so much stronger afterwards, so much more active in his interactions with Eddie. When Venom was quiet, Eddie felt like a part of himself was missing, he felt out of sync and off balance. If eating people was the way to fix Venom and make them even closer, then eat people they would.

            Of course, being the same being, Venom knew about Eddie’s conflict regarding the consumption of other human beings, and though he stayed quiet and let Eddie work it out on his own, Venom was just thrilled his human was so worried about him. About them. Worried enough to let him eat extra bad guys.

            They’d already been eating bad guys anyways, and it wasn’t like anyone would actually miss these people. They were the scum of the Earth, the thieves, murderers, and rapists that were better put to use as their midnight snack than kept alive to cause more pain and waste more oxygen.

            Tonight was the night. From now on Eddie only requested that the people he eat were bad, he didn’t even have to spare any of these creep’s lives this time. Venom was thrilled, and because they shared the same body and the same mind, Eddie was thrilled because he was. This final acceptance of Venom and their connection just felt so natural. As if only now were they both completely aligned with one another.

            Tonight Eddie might as well have taken Venom to an all-you-can-eat buffet. The guys they were going after ran an underground child pornography ring. Eddie had been researching these guys and following the ringleader around town for days beforehand. He had wanted to make sure the main courses for their first feast were guys Eddie wouldn’t even begin to feel bad for killing and eating. They deserved nothing better than the most horrific deaths for what they were doing and what they had done in the past. Eddie almost felt bad Venom had to eat people this vile and disgusting.

            “ **Don’t feel bad. I can’t wait to rip their limbs from their bodies.** ” Eddie could feel Venom’s childlike excitement at the thought.

            “Glad you’re excited, buddy.” Eddie smiled, not caring about the odd looks people nearby gave him when he started chatting with himself. They lived in the city, they’d probably seen weirder things than a guy talking to himself in the frozen aisle of the grocery store. He knew how they looked, kind of sickly and having half of a conversation with something nobody else saw. People would probably just write them off as some sort of addict and move on with their day.

            “ **Excited that you aren’t ignoring our nature anymore, Eddie.** ” A warm, contented feeling emanated through their chest from Venom, “ **But also excited to bite some heads off.** ”

            “Yeah, I figured it’s about time I stop hurting us by holding onto my skewed moral compass.”

            Eddie could feel Venom’s agreement, “ **It didn’t make sense when we were already eating the occasional human anyways.** ”

            “I know, I know I’m an idiot.” Eddie rolled his eyes, not bothering to swat the black tendril creeping from under the sleeve of his hoodie away from the candy display and instead pretending he didn’t notice the growing pile of chocolate bars in the basket they were holding.

            “ **You’re a bitch.** ” Venom corrected, “ **But slightly less of a bitch now.** ”

            Eddie snorted and moved to stand in line for the register, “Wow, thank you. That really means a lot coming from a parasite.”

            “ **Take it back.** ”

            “Hey, considering our dinner plans, I can call you whatever I want.” The girl behind the register started ringing their stuff up and was saying something to them. Eddie completely tuned her out and didn’t even realize she had spoken, absentmindedly placing a handful of bills on the counter between them.

            “ **Not a parasite…** ” Venom grumbled, and Eddie could feel him pouting in their head.

            “It’s just a nickname.” Eddie consoled the symbiote, collecting their bags in one hand and their change in the other, “You know I love you.”

            Venom perked up a little at that and was back to his good mood from before, “ **Love you too, Eddie. Let’s go eat some pedophiles.** ”

            “We should probably wait until it’s actually dark but yeah, sure.” Eddie gave Venom a little mental pat, “We can eat as many pedophiles as you want.”

            “ **Promise?** ”

            “I promise.”

            They walked back to their apartment in comfortable silence except for the few times Venom commented on the possible deliciousness of someone’s pet dog or at one point, toddler. At that one Eddie cautiously explained why eating a child would be a bad idea and how it was basically the exact opposite of eating only bad guys.

            Eddie worked on research for his next article while they waited for night to fall and Venom slept to gather his strength. It made Eddie a little sad to see Venom tired but he reminded himself that after tonight that would be over.

            He’d expected to feel a little more apprehensive about the night ahead of them but found himself actually looking forward to it. These guys were terrible and he and Venom would be back to their healthy, happy selves again once they were taken care of. It was really a win-win scenario.

            As soon as the city grew dark and the sun finished setting Venom was wide awake and ready to go. Eddie could barely keep him from taking a shortcut out their apartment window onto the street below much to Venom’s frustration.

            The ringleader of the operation – if creating and selling disgusting photographs of little kids could be called an operation – owned a local internet cafe. A crime on its own really because weren’t all café’s nowadays internet cafés?

Regardless, He carried out his more disturbing business in the basement apartment below. When Eddie had followed him he’d heard the guy talking to someone – probably one of his disgusting buddies – over the phone about using the internet from the café to conduct their business as dozens of people connected to their wifi a day and if the police ever tracked the IP address from their website any past customer of theirs was a suspect.  

            After a few days of surveillance, Eddie had been able to patch together a rough estimate of the days and times they got together. Tonight was the night they’d all be in one, easy to target place.

            When they arrived, they wasted no time and knocked on the door to the little apartment, Venom was hidden for now but he waited just under the surface of their skin, ready to fight. The man who answered the door looked sweaty and pale. Obviously he hadn’t been expecting any more guests at his little party.

            “Hey man,” Eddie’s smile was just a little too wide to be natural, “Did someone order a pizza?”

            The man’s eyes darted around behind Eddie, probably checking to see if anyone was hiding beside the door or in the shadows that could pose a threat. “N-no, wrong address I guess. Sorry.” He tried to close the door but was stopped by Eddie’s foot.

            “Damn, are you sure? I swear this was the house.” Eddie pretended to check his phone, “Five-o-one Pedo Street, right?”

            Any remaining color drained from the man’s face. He lunged further into the apartment as if to flee but before he had the chance two long black tendrils shot out and grabbed him. One curling around the guy’s torso and one around his neck.

            Complete, animal fear overtook the guy’s face as Venom came out to play and towered over him. Eddie grimaced in their mind, “Better eat him before he shits himself.”

            Venom grinned and licked the guy’s cheek, “ **Gladly.** ”

            All in all, there were more creeps in the house than expected and not even Venom couldn’t eat them all. Not that he didn’t try, but when they started feeling so full they were nauseous Eddie asked him to stop. They just killed the rest of the guys and left their bodies and disgusting evidence of their dealings for the police to find.

            Eddie walked home with their hood up and head down, hoping nobody saw the bloodstains around their mouth and the pieces of sin and bone he could feel between his teeth.

            The strange thing was, though he could taste the blood and viscera from their meal, Eddie didn’t feel sick. Sure, they both felt way too full, but the memory of ripping apart and consuming another human being didn’t fill Eddie with the same disgust it used to. He felt… good. Healthier than before.

            “ **We were sick from not eating, Eddie. Our internal organs were being broken down for fuel. We are whole now, healthy and happy.** ” Venom purred and cured up in a corner of their mind like a satisfied cat. Eddie smiled and felt a surge of affection for his other half.

            “Healthy and happy.” Eddie agreed. And for the first time in his life, Eddie really was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading! I only saw Venom last night and I'm already deep into the fandom. If you've read any of my other works you know to expect a lot of murder ahead and codependency from our lovely couple. Please leave a comment and let me know what you think so far!
> 
> By the way - my tumblr handle is also antimatics if you wanna hit me up on there!


	2. Sugar Daddy Stark

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eddie has to fly, Venom gets some tasty snacks in New York.

            They stayed happy for a pretty long time, eating some bad guys and writing articles exposing others. Their relationship only became closer and easier, Venom launched Eddie out of windows less often, and Eddie was now entirely on board with eating bad guys. The perfect relationship for any human-alien duo.

            But their happiness couldn’t last forever, and the day Eddie got his new assignment to interview a certain rich Avenger in New York their perfect little bubble popped and uncertainty crept in once again.

            “ **Who is Tony Stark? Can we eat him?** ” Venom prodded, curious about the sudden drop in his counterpart’s mood.

            “No, he’s not a bad guy. Not really.” Eddie sighed, “He’s a hero, honestly. He’s one of the Avengers – they’ve saved the world a ton. Even saved it from aliens.” He said meaningfully, hoping Venom caught the reasoning behind his concerns.

            “ **But we’re heroes too, Eddie. He can’t save the world from other heroes, right?** ” Venom didn’t understand the big deal, wouldn’t a hero be happy about meeting them? Eddie had said they were heroes.

            “Well, sure, V, we’re heroes but I don’t think Stark is a big fan of aliens. Or the fact that we, you know… eat people.”

            “ **Sounds like even more of a pussy than you. We should definitely eat him.** ”

            Eddie couldn’t help but smile, he had to give Venom props for his persistence at the very least. If only solving all of their problems could be as simple as eating them.

            “ **It is that simple, Eddie.** ” Venom whined.

            Eddie ignored his Symbiote’s antics and started packing for their trip to New York. He wasn’t a fan of flying but the ticket had already been booked for him – booked a _nd_ paid for already by Tony Stark himself for some strange reason – so he would have to suffer through. At least Venom would probably get a kick out of being in an airplane for the first time.

            On second thought, the details surrounding their assignment in New York were unusually vague. What little information Eddie had gotten was strange, and very unlike the other interviews he’d traveled for in the past. They knew they were going to be interviewing Tony Stark, but Eddie had yet to be told exactly _what_ this interview was even for in the first place. Stark had bought the ticket for them himself for some reason, and those things combined with the fact that they were meeting an Avenger in the Avenger’s _Tower_ added up to be cause for concern.

            “ **If we can’t eat them and it might not be safe, then we shouldn’t go.** ” Venom chimed in helpfully, and Eddie could feel Venom curling around their stomach nervously, worried about the safety of his host.

            Eddie considered it for a brief moment. Skipping the flight out tomorrow morning and staying home to eat tater tots and bad guys instead. The idea of skipping the trip in the airplane was tempting enough on its own.

            “If it really is the Avengers that want to see us and not just a normal interview, I think ditching would be just about the most suspicious thing we could do, dear.” If they didn’t show up then any suspicions they might have about Eddie would only be confirmed, and the idea of the whole of the fucking Avengers coming over to San Francisco to bust down their flimsy apartment door and kick their ass just wasn’t that appealing.

            “ ** _We_ would kick _their_ asses.**” Venom growled indignantly, “ **Would never let them hurt our host.** ”

The wave of protectiveness coming from Venom washed over Eddie and made him smile and feel all warm and fuzzy inside. He made sure Venom could feel how happy and how much he appreciated Venom keeping them safe, “I know, I know you would, love, but I’d still prefer not to battle a team of superheroes and endanger the lovely people of San Francisco.”

“ **Lovely? This morning that man in the truck told us to go fuck ourselves because we were late getting across the street.** ” Oh right, Venom still wanted to eat that guy’s head. Also, he still wanted to know how exactly one fucked _themselves_ , did he mean masturbating? Because as far as Venom could tell that was supposed to be a positive thing and not an insult.

Eddie shrugged helplessly and forcibly ignored Venom’s strange musings, “There may be some… colorful people in this city, but they don’t deserve to die or get hurt because of it.”

“ **That guy does.** ” Venom grumbled.

*

Their flight, unfortunately, was scheduled to leave at six-thirty in the goddamned morning. Which meant Eddie had to drag their forsaken ass out of bed at four to make it to the hour-early check-in time. Because whoever scheduled flights apparently hates humanity. And alien life forms that like to sleep in in the morning.

“ **Not a morning person, Eddie.** ” Venom complained, barely awake in the back of their head. The exauhstion the symbiote was radiating only made Eddie sleepier and he was tempted to catch a cab home and let them go back to bed.

“Me neither, darling.” Eddie sighed, ignoring the way the people in line around them at security gave them a weird look. He didn’t care on a normal day, and he definitely didn’t care this early in the morning.

Security was slow, but pretty uneventful and they got through with minimal hassle. They had just enough time to buy a large coffee and a chocolate muffin from the Starbucks knockoff by their gate before they were supposed to board. The coffee helped Eddie wake up and the chocolate helped Venom, who crept out from Eddie’s sleeve when nobody was looking to consume the muffin in a single bite.

“ **More.** ” Venom demanded.

“Sorry, no time. We’ll find something when we get to New York.” Eddie crumpled up their trash and threw it away on their way towards the gate.

Venom grinned from within their mind, “ **Bad guys?** ” He asked hopefully.

“We’ll see.”

            *

            The flight was terrifying, horrible, and the worst experience of Eddie’s life. Well, no, not r _eally_ but it sucked. The tin can thousands of feet in the sky hit way too much turbulence for Eddie’s comfort, and the prescription drugs he’d been given by his doctor for flying didn’t even work because they – Venom, to be specific – metabolized them too fast. Eddie ended up taking a new pill every few minutes until they ran out, much to the concern of the person seated beside them and the stewardess who had walked by.

            “ **Sorry, Eddie.** ” Venom had apologized sheepishly, rubbing over Eddie’s tense back and shoulders under their shirt in an attempt to comfort him. It helped, but only until Eddie accidentally looked out the window at the tops of the clouds below and started quietly freaking out again. “ **It is beautiful though.** ” Venom sighed contentedly, brief images of the cold, dark rock Venom had come from flitting by in the back of Eddie’s mind.

            Eddie smiled softly, happy that Venom was having a good time at least and happy that his symbiote wasn’t on that awful rock in space anymore.

            Neither of them liked the landing at JFK airport. The whole plane shook when it hit the landing strip and though that was pretty normal, especially in a plane this size, both Eddie and Venom were thoroughly freaked out. If anyone noticed the way Eddie’s fingers turned into black claws when he grabbed the edges of his seat, they didn’t say anything.

            Venom loved New York. As soon as they left the airport food carts and delicious humans with their tasty-looking dogs lined the streets. If a few pigeons went missing in a small puff of feathers as Eddie walked by, well, at least it was better than Fido or Patches being sacrificed to the voracious black goo monster roaming the streets of New York.

            “ **These birds are much more delicious than the gulls at home. They don’t even try to escape. They are too fat.** ” Venom hummed happily.

            Eddie grimaced as he felt Venom catch yet another pigeon as they passed it on the sidewalk, so quickly and efficiently that nobody saw. “C’mon man, you don’t know where those things have been or what they’ve been eating.”

            “ **Better tasting than that drug dealer from the other day was with all of that meth in his system. Completely ruined his delicious brain chemicals.** ”

            “I can’t believe you’re still complaining about that.” Eddie didn’t comment on the bird-napping anymore after that.

*

            Avengers Tower, or _Stark_ Tower, as Eddie had known it as when he lived in New York, was just as huge and imposing as ever. Eddie didn’t want to say Stark was overcompensating for anything, but…

            From their hotel room – a ridiculously nice suite a _lso_ paid for by Mr. Stark, who was starting to act more like their sugar daddy than their interviewee – they had a great view of the Tower. Or, more specifically, their view was _just_ the tower. Whether Stark just wanted to show off or wanted Eddie close enough to keep an eye on while he was in town, well, that was uncertain. Most likely both, but there wasn’t much to do about it.

            What Eddie did know however, was that all of their room service bills were being paid for oh so generously by Stark as well. Eddie wasn’t going to turn down free food, especially when such a sizable chunk of his paycheck went into satiating their appetite.

            Turns out, when one of the richest men I the world was paying for your food, nobody asked any questions when you requested five live lobsters and a few pounds of chocolate and tater tots straight to your door. There were probably stranger requests in a nice, discreet place like this every day.

            The live lobsters weren’t something they’d usually go for after their… incident in the restaurant that one time, but what better way to spend unnecessary money than live seafood and expensive Belgian truffles decorated in edible gold?

            And so that was how they spent their evening, lounging in the Jacuzzi bathtub, Venom draped across his shoulders, and a constant stream of room service left just outside the door. Retrieved, of course, by a single long tendril of Venom reaching from the bathroom into the hall once the poor boy who had been running trays back and forth all night had left.

            “ **We like New York.** ” Venom purred contentedly, moving further down Eddie’s back to steal the jets away from him again.

            Eddie shoved Venom off of the jets and rolled his eyes, “I’ll bet you do, you better not become a spoiled little parasite after this trip. We can’t afford a live goldfish for you to eat let alone a lobster.”

            “ **Lobster is good. But bad guys are tastier.** ” Venom reassured him, lovingly stroking the side of Eddie’s face while tearing the head off of a lobster on the tray to their left.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading I'm loving you guys' response to this fic! Please leave me a comment letting me know what you think so far! 
> 
> Heads up, I'm doing NaNoWriMo again this November (It's a challenge online to write 50k words in a month) so look out for the updates to this fic and possibly my other ones - and probably some new ones! If you'd like to cheer me on or yell at me for not updating hit me up on Tumblr @ antimatics
> 
> The Avengers will show up next chapter I promise!


	3. Just Touristy Things

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Venom and Eddie explore the attractions of New York, from the Empire State to the... various dining options.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNING for this chapter! Includes semi-graphic description of rape/sexual assault. I tried to keep it pretty brief but just a heads up!

            The next day Eddie and Venom took some time to do some of the more touristy things around the city. Their meeting with Tony Stark was scheduled for three thirty in the afternoon, so Eddie figured they had time to explore.

            Venom really wanted to visit the zoo, but Eddie didn’t really feel like that was a great idea. He doubted Stark would cover endangered exotic animals as part of the room service tab. Venom feigned innocence at the idea, but couldn’t hide his secret desire to eat a tiger from their bond.

            “I don’t think you’d like it.” Eddie tried, “I’ve heard animals that eat meat aren’t as tasty as herbivores.” They also didn’t really need to go to prison for the theft and murder of such a valuable creature that was going extinct.

            He could feel Venom’s pout from inside their head, “ **We liked that stray cat. Tigers are just extra-large stray cats.** ”

            “I’m still trying to forget about that sweet little alley cat you made us eat.” Eddie cringed and tried to block the memory from resurfacing in their mind.

            In the end they decided to visit the Empire State Building, which Venom was very disappointed to not be allowed to climb, but very happy about the view once they reached the top by elevator. Eddie was less happy, and stayed away from the edge. Even if there was protective railing he didn’t trust it at all. Venom was very disgruntled that Eddie was afraid of falling when he had Venom to catch them. No faith from his host. But the pretty view almost made up for it.

            After their little sight-seeing adventure, they went on a walk to find a good restaurant for lunch. The sidewalk was crowded with wide-eyed tourists and New Yorkers that all looked either consistently tired or angry somehow.

            They were just a few blocks away from a Chinese place Eddie had promised Venom was to die for – to which Venom scolded Eddie for thinking they’d ever die from something as wonderful as food – when their sensitive hearing picked up on the sound of some kind of struggle coming from a back alley way nearby.

            Eddie turned sharply at the sound and changed the course of their path down the street, “I think our lunch plans may have just changed.”

            “ **Perfect, heads are always better than egg rolls.** ” Venom grinned, ready to spring out and protect them at a moment’s notice.

            “Depends on the egg rolls.” Eddie protested, rounding a corner and entering the dimly lit alley the noise had come from. They didn’t see anything at first but their keen senses picked up on the tang of fresh blood on the air, slightly tainted by the smell of rot coming from the dumpster to their right.

            “ **Behind the dumpster.** ” Venom answered his unasked question helpfully.

Eddie poked their head around the side of the dumpster and froze. They’d eaten plenty of rapists but they’d never actually caught one in the act. It was horrifying, the man had some poor woman pinned to the filthy ground, top ripped open and skirt pushed up around her stomach, knife to her throat.

Before even Venom could react Eddie was grabbing the man by the back of the neck and shirt and heaving him away from the terrified woman. He threw him to the ground and straddled his chest, throwing all of his weight into the punch straight to the guy’s throat. Kind of a dirty move but this fucker deserved no mercy whatsoever. This fucker deserved the worst possible punishment.

As soon as Eddie’s punch landed and the guy started choking and gagging, Venom burst forth from their skin. Long claws found their way into the rapist’s stomach and up under the inside of his ribcage to puncture his lungs and tear long chunks of them out when he pulled back for the next blow. The guy was shrieking now, coughing up his own blood with every sob and screaming even more as it got in his eyes and blinded him.

The last thing he saw before his sight went red was Venom completing their shift into a giant black goo monster and leaning forward to rip his arm from its socket with their teeth.

“ **Stupid human, too disgusting to even be called a human. Filth.** ” Venom snarled, tearing the man limb from limb and making sure to separate a certain piece of genitalia from its owner as painfully as possible.

Eddie wasn’t usually one for torture when they did this but he had zero complaints to Venom’s treatment of this guy. If there was a way to do worse Eddie would have done it himself without a second thought.

The man was somehow still alive by the time Venom took his head off, conscious and gloriously present for every moment of his end. Venom purred happily as they cracked his skull between their teeth.

When it was over Venom looked around them, suddenly aware once more of their surroundings. The woman hadn’t run like they’d expected, but cowered against the side of the dumpster with her knees pulled to her chest and ripped blouse pulled close around her shoulders.

“ **You are safe now. You can leave.** ” Venom told her, confused as to why the human would still be in the vicinity of danger.

 _She’s probably in shock, V. She just experienced some major trauma, and then we traumatized her even more by eviscerating another human being in front of her and turning into a scary monster._ Eddie tried to help explain the situation to Venom.

Venom responded in their head, “ **But he was her attacker. She should be happy he is dead.** ”

Eddie sighed and if he could move his hands to his face he would be rubbing the bridge of his nose in frustration, _I think she’s a little overwhelmed._

Before Venom could respond – and probably make the situation even worse for this poor woman – a figure in a red suit dropped into the alley and shot some sort of sticky, white substance at their head.

“Stop! Get away from her!” The… child it would seem… held up his hands threateningly.

It clicked, then. _Oh shit,_ Eddie laughed in their head, _I think that’s Spiderman. Well, Spiderboy apparently._

Venom didn’t move and ripped what they now recognized as webbing away from their face, growing and baring their teeth at their unwelcome intruder. “ **You will not harm us, Spiderboy.** ” He warned, taking a menacing step towards the superhero.

The kid shot another web at their feet, tangling them together and tripping Venom up for a moment, “I won’t say it again, buddy. Get away from the nice lady.”

Venom, of course, refused to take orders from the human runt in front of them and kept up his tough-guy act, snarling and imposing as usual.

Eddie tried to send soothing vibes to his companion, _I think it might be better if I take this one, darling._

Venom growled at the idea and responded to Eddie out loud, “ **No, must protect us. Wouldn’t be safe.** ”

Spiderman was honestly a little confused, “What? Protect her?” He glanced at the terrified woman again, “I don’t think she feels very safe right now. I don’t know what you are but I’m sure we can-“

_He doesn’t realize we’re… us, darling. He thinks we’re just some mindless monster, let me talk to him, alright?_

Venom cut him off replying to Eddie, “ **Not a monster!** ”      

Eddie kept trying to send waves of calm to the angry symbiote, _Of course not, love. But he doesn’t know us yet._

Peter smiled awkwardly, and edged a little closer, trying to find a way to place himself between the huge monster and the woman, “Alright, never said you were uh, a monster or anything buddy. I’m sure we can work this out if you’ll just…”

Peter lost his rambling train of thought as the… thing began to shrink in on itself and distort until it became a man. A normal, seemingly human, man. Whose mouth and hands were covered in blood. Peter couldn’t help but gawk at what had just happened, freezing up a little in his distraction.

Eddie tried for a friendly smile and backed away from Spiderman a little. Maybe he could slip out of the alley and into the crowd before the kid got too good of a look at their face. “Sorry about him, kid, we’ll just uh… I mean _I’ll_ just get out of your hair now and –“

Both Eddie and Venom cringed when their foot caught on the mangled torso of the rapist from a moment ago, drawing their and the kid’s attention to the corpse. Obviously Spiderman had had yet to notice the fun addition to their group when he’d arrived and the poor kid –  even through his mask – looked horrified at the sight. Sure the body was missing its arms… and legs… and yeah, the head had definitely been eaten, but it wasn’t _that_ disturbing. Even with the entrails hanging out onto the pavement.

Okay yeah, the poor kid would be scarred for life.

Eddie tried his friendly smile again and put his hands up awkwardly in a sign of non-violence, “Oops, well… we’ll just get out of your hair and uh…” They swiftly found themselves webbed to the dirty brick wall across form the dumpster. “Should’ve seen that coming.” Eddie conceded.

The woman obviously thought she was suddenly in the clear and took her chance to flee out of the alley and onto the bustling New York sidewalk, tugging her skirt back down and clutching the sides of her top tightly around her shaking body.

“Sorry we scared you!” Eddie called after her, unable to think of anything else to say. What could you really say to someone who had just been sexually assaulted and then forced to watch her abuser being eaten alive in the span of like ten minutes?

Spiderman stood in front of them, shaking ever so slightly. It would be unnoticeable to any human witnessing the scene, but their senses could see and smell the fear and disgust emanating from this poor kid.

Eddie winced, “Sorry we scared you too.” He grimaced, “We didn’t mean to frighten her.”

“W-what the hell a _re_ you?” Peter tried to sound confident, like Mr. Stark and Captain Rodgers, but his brain was having difficulty comprehending the situation and difficulty focusing on something other than the bloody lump of dead guy just five feet away from him.

“We didn’t hurt her, I swear!” Eddie defended himself, “This guy was attacking her and we were just walking by when we heard them.”

Peter slowly turned to look down at the corpse again, “So you decided to turn him into ground beef?”

“ **He tasted much better than ground beef.** ” Venom spoke from Eddie’s mouth, their eyes turning greyish-white when he took momentary control over their body.

If Eddie could have thrown his hands up in frustration he would have, but these stupid fucking webs stopped him, “Are you kidding me, V? Did you really think that would _help_ the situation?”

Peter felt very suddenly ill, “You… you a _te_ this dude? What the f- why would you ever… oh my _God_.” He had to turn away from them. Away from this cannibal-monster-psycho guy and the remains of his _meal._ “I think I need to call Mister Stark, yeah, he’ll know what to do. Karen, call Mister Stark p-please.”

Eddie struggled against his restraints, “Oh, ha… that won’t be necessary kid! C’mon! Let me just explain what’s going on! Don’t call Stark.” Great, they didn’t even get the chance to lie their asses off in their interview later. They were fucked.

Eddie felt cold all of a sudden when he realized what this meant. Fucking Stark and his hatred of aliens. That fancy fucking lab equipment he probably had loads of in his little tower. This was basically just the Life Foundation round two for them.

Venom recoiled when he realized Eddie’s line of thinking, their body started quivering slightly and black goo started encasing Eddie, their eyes going white-grey again and fingers turning to claws, “ **You… Will _not_ hurt Eddie. Never again. We will protect Eddie.**” Venom snarled, teeth and tongue protruding from Eddie’s mouth as they transformed in a terrifying grimace, “ **We s _aved_ the injured human. _Protected_ her!**”

They tore through the web restraints and lunged towards Spiderman, fully transformed into Venom and blinded by rage at the idea of harm coming to their host. Peter dodged Venom’s attack and shot a stream of web back at them, trying to stall until Tony could show up.

Lucky for Peter, as soon as Friday had gotten footage of the mystery goo monster Peter had stumbled across, she’d gotten ahold of Tony and informed him as per her programming. Tony showed up just as Venom was gaining the upper hand in their fight and swiftly sent a small-scale missile carrying an extremely strong tranquilizer into the back of the monster’s neck. The ingredients of which he may or may not have lifted off of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s secure network during one of his casual hacks of their more ‘secure’ databases.

Venom and Eddie went down hard, their limbs refusing to respond to either of their attempts at movement and their vision blacking out.

Venom was out first, and Eddie panicked inside their head as he called out to Venom and received no reply, searching for any feeling of his other half as he struggled to stay awake. His thoughts were getting cloudier and harder to keep track of… and then nothing.

As they went out Venom’s hulking black form retreated to slowly reveal Eddie once more, this time unconscious and huddled in the fetal position on the cold, bloodstained cement. Small and vulnerable without Venom’s protection.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's another update courtesy of my NaNoWriMo labors. Hope you enjoyed reading, please leave me a comment telling me what you think so far!
> 
> Also, I'm working on a possible Peter Parker-centric fic. If you guys would be interested in reading that if I were to work on it some more and post it then let me know.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! I only saw Venom last night and I'm already deep into the fandom. If you've read any of my other works you know to expect a lot of murder ahead and codependency from our lovely couple. Please leave a comment and let me know what you think so far!
> 
> By the way - my tumblr handle is also antimatics if you wanna hit me up on there!


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